Disclaimer: The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins.

A/N: This story is the sequel to my other story Three Girls, and also corresponds with the parallel stories Tulip's Tale and How to Win the Hunger Games. While I have done my best not to make it necessary to have read those stories, especially Three Girls which is the main story and is complete, this story will contain spoilers so if you wish to read it first that would be good. It also contains more detailed introductions to the OCs mentioned.

However, for you returning readers and those who wish to read more about District 8, please read and enjoy this story. Don't forget to leave reviews, as I'd like to see what you think. This story will eventually go to the 69th Hunger Games, and might continue longer than that. The Victory Tour starts on approximately Chapter 5, and the Hunger Games Reaping will around Chapter 10, although I am not certain about that yet.

Now, without further ado, let's start this Hunger Games story. :)

Prologue - District 8

Suffra

Four months, three weeks, two days, and eleven hours. The Victory Tour was approaching, just a dot many months away. She had only just got back from the Capitol several weeks ago, but already she dreaded it. It was moving forwards, each day taking forever but she wished time would go back.

Four months, three weeks, two days, and ten hours. Technically it was night time. Nobody else would notice that she was just sitting there, staring off into space when she was meant to be sleeping. She was tired, exhausted, but she did not want to go to sleep. This was as peaceful as she got, staring off into space. Whenever she slept she went back to the Games, or woke her family with her screams.

Four months, three weeks, two days, and nine hours. Six a.m. Dawn was beginning to come across the horizon, the dark smog clouds were beginning to get lighter as the sun beat against them. It was almost approaching another day. Another day of acting like absolutely nothing had changed. She could gush; pretend that nothing had happened. Her family was doing that as well, but neither of them were that good at acting. Everybody knew that everything had changed.

Before, they had not lived in Victor's Village, and she had not been the fourth ever Victor from District 8. Nobody had expected her to win; she could see that from their reactions. District 8 did not have many Victors, as they were disadvantaged when it came to most arenas. Most of the residents had never even seen greenery.

Four months, three weeks, two days, and eight hours. The clocked ticked further along, and she blinked as she noticed another hour had passed. Her mind was elsewhere, worrying about the Victory Tour again. She tried not to look back, but looking forwards seemed to be the exact same as looking back. Another Games. Another twenty-four children sent to their doom, even the survivor being badly damaged.

Slowly she got up, seeing that her knife was still attached to her belt in a way that made her feel safe, she headed downstairs. The house was massive, but she hated it. It belonged to the Capitol, not her. It was luxury that nobody else in the district could afford, and she got it instead because she played their way. Because she killed to win a fight to the death.

"Hi Suffra!" her twin sister, Iva, called over to her. She was standing in the kitchen, holding a frying pan and making pancakes. Pancakes. The ingredients used the make such a mixture were ordinarily unavailable to the normal residents of the district. Of course, the Capitol did try to spoil its Victors with things they could easily retract. Here, well done, you killed people. Have a free house and anything you need, but you must return to train more people to fight to the death. Don't do what you are told? We can take it all back and more. "Did you sleep well?"

"Yes," Suffra lied, sitting down at the table and collecting her plate, maintaining the pretence of normal. Although really, having food like that was abnormal for them and she still hadn't got used to it. Iva narrowed her eyes, looking at her sister concerned. Suffra cursed herself, thinking that she could not attempt to lie to her twin sister without getting caught. They were too close for that. Or at least they had been, before the Games had formed a rift between them which was treacherous to cross.

"Did you sleep at all?" Iva asked.

"Yes," Suffra lied again. "It's okay, I am completely fine."

Before there had been no secrets between them. It was not just about the 68th Hunger Games; they all agreed that they did not want to speak of it again. Suffra just felt like she spent the whole time either lying, running or hiding. And she was always called out on it.

"You haven't been fine in ages," Iva said, switching the cooker off and dumping the pancakes on a plate, cutting them up. She passed Suffra one of the plates, which she took quickly. "Please don't lie to me."

Iva looked upset, and Suffra felt even worse guilt course through her. She had done everything for her sister; even volunteered for her to prevent her going into the Games herself. Now she could not even reassure her, as she could not lie. It hurt Iva to see her that way, and she did not want to hide completely. She had to see Iva.

"Can we not talk about this?" Suffra begged, and Iva looked away.

"When? It's been almost three weeks since you have returned," Iva said. Suffra looked away, before getting up and walking out of the room, grabbing her coat. Running. The thing she seemed to be doing the most often now. To imagine, Victors were meant to be strong. She thought she had probably been stronger before, or at least she had felt so much safer. Suddenly she needed air.

"I'll see you later," Suffra said, slamming the door behind her. She knew she was overreacting completely, but she had to get out. Go to her true home, which was some miles away. It would take her all morning to get there, especially counting how frequently she stopped. She always felt bad returning to that area of town without any money, especially now that she had tons, but she did not want to go back inside again. Running, hiding. Always running and hiding. She really was bad at acting.

Quickly she left her own garden and crept to the house opposite, looking backwards to make sure nobody was watching her from the windows of her own house. Although technically the house was hers, her parents and sister also lived there. It seemed that she had been avoiding them more than she should have, especially now when she was technically sneaking out without leaving a note.

Cecelia lived opposite her. Cecelia had been her mentor, but Suffra had never shared any of her plans with her before the arena. She had never figured out how to explain her plans if they were the only ones she had, as if somebody managed to poke holes in them she would be left with nothing. Her current plan was to survive, and to stay up forever with this thing known as caffeine as an aid. She did not need anybody to point out the holes in that plan.

Suffra knocked twice on Cecelia's door. Cecelia lived in her house with her husband and her two year old daughter, but Suffra was glad that she was the one who opened the door.

"Can I borrow some money?" Suffra asked quickly. "Just a little bit."

"Running from your own house again?" Cecelia noticed what she was doing straight away. Suffra nodded, caught in the act. It was not just her family who was beginning to catch her out. Cecelia knew her too well now, and when it came to being a Victor Cecelia knew Suffra so much more than her family did. "In which case, I am not going to give you anything. You've got your own money, and you should not run from your family."

Suffra frowned, sometimes wishing that Cecelia was still not paying attention to her. Before the Games, it had been easy to convince her mentor that she was just another tribute who had no plan and wanted to finish things quickly. Now it was less easy. "I just want to go into town."

"How about you let your sister come with you. She'll be very happy to see people prosper with the money you give them," Cecelia said. Cecelia was always trying to fix everything, trying to mend the relationship between Suffra and her family. And she was right. Iva would really like that.

"How did you ever win the Hunger Games? You are too nice," Suffra muttered, regretting it when she saw Cecelia's expression. As she did not want to make yet another person unhappy, she relented. "Fine. Sorry. I'll go."

It felt like the walk of shame going back to her own house after that, even though she ran quickly and ducked through the back entrance. Her parents were up now as well, sitting at the table and eating the pancakes Iva made. They looked like the perfect happy family until Suffra came into the room, and they all turned to look at her.

Then they quickly looked away, making it far too obvious what they had been talking about. Suffra ducked her head down and took her place. They really were as bad at acting as each out.

"I'm glad you are back," Iva said.

"Would you like to go out to town?" Suffra asked, suddenly hoping that her sister said yes and that she didn't have to walk on her own. Iva made her slightly less paranoid, slightly more trustful, something that she felt she needed. Suffra used to be like that as well, and hated that it had changed.

"The rich part or the poor part?" Iva asked. Like all districts, District 8 had both rich areas and poor areas, although the majority of the residential areas fell into the latter category.

"The poor part," Suffra answered.

"Okay, I'll bring some food," Iva said carefully. They both hated the tension that was between them now, but there was not much that could be done. It was still better than the alternative.

"Were you talking about something before I got here?" Suffra asked. Everybody exchanged glances, and she looked back at her food again. "As it is so obviously about me, care to tell me?"

"It's nothing you should worry about," her father said. Suffra felt dread in the pit of her stomach, but ignored it. They could keep their secrets as long as she was able to keep hers, but none of them kept them as well as they thought they did.

"You don't have to do anything about me," Suffra said, guessing what they were doing. "I'm just a little worried about the Victory Tour at the moment. That is all." They all knew how much of an understatement that was, but she made her voice deliberately light. Maybe it would fool somebody.

"Let's go," Suffra said eventually, as she finished her food. Iva followed her as she grabbed her money, opening the door quickly. As soon as they left Victor's Village, the quality of the streets declined sharply. First there were the high-rise buildings filled with hundreds of people living in each one; then there were the factories, large grey structures letting off smoke and smog at a colossal rate.

District 8 had the largest population of all the districts, so even with the amount of money she had now she could not help everybody. While the high-rise area was mostly deserted, the factories were full of life as they were run almost constantly. There were some workers outside as the shifts were about to change, but something felt different in the air.

"Suffra! Suffra Hadley!" one of the workers called, recognizing her instantly. It took Suffra a moment to place the girl: Esther Parkel. Next to her stood her boyfriend, Amil Colden. They stood close together, their relationship having intensified since the last time Suffra had seen them which had been before her Games.

"Esther, Amil," Iva greeted them. "Have you just finished?"

"No. Double shifts. I snuck out to take a break though," Esther said. Amil kissed her once more, then left her to it. Suffra only then noticed that he actually did not work in the same place she did, and had come over to visit her. "Iva. You are so lucky you got out of it."

"I didn't let her go back. The factories can be dangerous," Suffra spoke on behalf of her sister, something Iva was not happy with. She was about to retort, like old times, that she could speak for herself when Esther beat her to it.

"Yeah, the great and mighty Capitol cannot install safety features into the factories that produce their completely necessary and fantastic fashion," Esther's voice dripped with sarcasm. "Oh, we love you so much, Capitol, for we are a bunch of masochistic morons."

Suffra was shocked. Iva gaped at her, then looked around for Peacekeepers who were usually everywhere. Esther could be whipped or worse for saying things like that, but she did not seem to have a care in the world.

"You can't say that," Iva said, shocked.

"And you're right. The factories are dangerous," Esther agreed. She flinched when she felt somebody behind her, but relaxed when she saw who it was.

"Sister, you must come inside," Esther's brother Earl said. The boy was just under Suffra's and Iva's age, a young fifteen, while Esther's next Reaping was her last one. That did not prevent them from looking alike, almost like they were fraternal twins. They both had dark hair, thin faces and dark blue chestnut shaped eyes.

Suffra only knew Esther through Earl, as once upon a time the two of them had been close. They lived in different areas but she and Earl used to sit next to each other in class, and at some point she and Esther had worked at the same factory before Esther moved up to the factory making Capitolian fashion designs.

"I'll get in there when I get in there," Esther said, anger in her voice which was not directed at her brother. Iva was still gaping at her, looking at Esther like she was insane. Luckily, they were just out of earshot of the Peacekeeper guarding the factory entrance.

"She's just mad because we almost got a martyr," Earl said, dropping his voice and talking to the two of them.

"Nobody will fight for a martyr nobody can remember," Esther said, still with the same hate. "And I didn't want her as a martyr."

"Who?" Iva asked. Esther looked at Suffra, deciding whether to tell and turning around again. Earl shook his head apologetically before chasing after his sister, although everybody could see that the same hate that was reflected in Esther's eyes was also reflected in his own.

"The one who should have lived!" Esther yelled, making half the people in the clearing turn to look at her. Understanding dawned through Suffra, as she was sure Esther was answering Iva's question. The Peacekeepers came and collected Esther, mostly due to the passion in her voice. They did not get the gist, so the most she would get was an afternoon in the stocks.

Suffra felt sick. Iva looked at her sister with concern, although she had reached the same conclusion.

"She was talking about the Games," Suffra said, pleased that her voice was steady. The whole thing had taken less than several seconds. "Earl!"

Earl, who had rushed after his sister, turned to look at Suffra again. Looking at the Peacekeepers quickly, Suffra held out several coins and placed them in his hands. Then she reached out into her pockets and took out several more.

"Don't worry, she doesn't mean what she said," Earl said, although he was lying. Iva smiled in relief, seeming to buy it. "I can't take your money."

"It's not charity," Suffra said. "Take it as a personal favour, for your sister, for telling me the truth. I don't need nearly as much money as I have." She dropped the money in Earl's hand, not caring whether he took it or whether he dropped it on the ground.

Iva followed her, running to catch up. "Are you okay? It wasn't the truth you know. The people in District 8 wanted you to return."

"Those with families to feed did," Suffra said, as she knew the truth. She raised her hand to quiet her sister, then walked more quickly down the streets so Iva started jogging to keep up. "It's coming up to Parcel Day, after all."

"The others did too," Iva said, but there was a tone in her voice which said it was a lie. Suffra had not played the Games the District 8 way. She had teamed up with a Career, the girl from 1, a deal which was already made for when the Career pack split. That would make sympathy for her drop like a rock. She had not thought about it at the time, but District 8 probably had either stopped backing her or thought she was despicable.

Suffra agreed with that assessment wholly. How was emotionally manipulating the girl from 1 into an alliance, then getting her to do your dirty work, and running away when she was killed anything but despicable?

"Only for Parcel Day," Suffra repeated. She stepped forward even more quickly, then stopped completely to look at her sister. "Esther was talking about Mimi Catalpa, wasn't she?"

Mimi, the girl who helped people. She was the female tribute from District 7, the one with hollow eyes that aided the tributes she was meant to fight on numerous occasions. Mimi had given Suffra berries, one which she knew now were food although she did not recognize them or at the time trusted them. Mimi had stayed with Anemone, the girl from District 4, when she had been injured and tried to make her comfortable although there was no hope of recovery.

Most notably, Mimi had protected the twelve year old boy from 3, going to the feast so that he would have food, and guarded him until the Gamemakers intervened. Those were only the things Suffra knew about. No doubt there were more.

The recap showed exactly zero of those things. Mimi had not featured in the recaps much; not even her death was shown. Suffra still did not know how she died. Even though she was not credited with a single kill, Mimi had helped her district partner kill Suffra's ally during the feast. Somehow, that did not make Suffra hate her. That was the only thing about Mimi the recaps showed, apart from her screaming in a tree during the bloodbath.

'Goodnight, Krystal Alrich. Sleep tight.' Suffra could almost hear the words again, in Mimi's haunting all-knowing voice. Sometimes she dreamt them too, when her attempts at staying awake were unsuccessful, except in those cases they were directed at her. The pool of blood remained the same though.

"Yes," Iva nodded, still watching Suffra's reaction cautiously. Suffra smiled to reassure her sister, then asked the question that she had asked once before, having been distracted by other matters and going home, but never truly received an answer of.

"How did Mimi die?" she asked.

"I haven't a clue," Iva admitted. "I was not in the room and I heard a cannon from the screens…" Suffra knew that Iva had been worried that it had been hers. "You were safe, so were Walton and Katran. They never showed it in the recaps."

"It must have been really bad then," Suffra said. "For the Capitol, I mean. They usually revel in showing the death of district-people." Suffra blinked, her hands hovering over the knife which was still attached to her belt. It had taken her less than a few seconds to go back into her Games thought patterns, and she had not even noticed it.

In a way it was good, seeing as that was the persona she would have to adopt on the Victory Tour and mentoring, but mostly it just made her completely sick. She swallowed, trying to get rid of the lump that had formed in her throat, before she continued.

"It's what's different, isn't it?" she said. Esther had spoken out against the Capitol, and she had done so in a crowded square. There was little chance, due to the crowds, that the Peacekeepers would overhear her, but others milling around certainly would. She'd held complete confidence that everybody else agreed with her, which surely they did. "This time we got so close to actually having a martyr we could fight for, yet she turned out forgotten like all of the others."

"Even in the final eight interviews, there weren't many people even in her home-district who knew her," Iva said, then thought about it. "I don't see why District 8 needs a martyr. Why does the symbol for what we are fighting for have to be dead?"

Suffra got it, although none of them quite said what they meant. District 8 was ready to fight against the Capitol; they had been for a long time. Whenever they took an opening, or enough people felt emotional enough about something, they would go for it whether it was a good thing for them or not. District 8 was one of the first districts to start fighting the Capitol in the rebellion and one of the last to stop. Since then, there had been some minor attempts at rebellion. But it hadn't been full scale. The one thing District 8 had more than any of the other districts was population, but the majority had to be behind it 'do or die' for it to work. So far, that wasn't the case. They had people they cared about to protect after all.

"Mimi would have been a great symbol if she was the survivor, wouldn't she?" Suffra said, unable to keep the wistful tone out of her voice. Shock crossed Iva's face as she moved closer to Suffra, taking more out of the statement and tone than Suffra meant to say.

"Are you glad you survived?" Iva asked, and Suffra flinched at the directness.

"It's what I was fighting for," Suffra said. That was the truth, and she was glad that she was back. But she was not glad about the way she had won the Games, or anything to do with that. She would happily forget it had happened, but that was hard to do when everything was designed to remind her.

Suffra noted how Iva kept close to her as they finally returned to their old neighbourhood. The streets were mostly empty, apart from the Peacekeepers that were guarding the streets for anyone skipping work, and they did not stop again. As soon as the Peacekeepers recognized her, they were not even stopped.

The neighbourhood was worse than she had remembered, the Capitol having spoilt her perspective. She sped up, stopping at their old house and looking inside. The house, a small single roomed shack surrounded by others, still belonged to them as technically that was where her family was meant to live.

"I prefer this house," Suffra said, touching the outside wall of the house. She pushed the door open and looked inside, although it seemed smaller than it had done before. The walls were grey, like they were closing in on her. Her breathing came out sharper and quicker. It did not really look alike at all, but somehow it reminded her of the rocks. Tumbling on top of her; trapping her in…

"Suffra," Iva said. Suffra paid little attention, her mind still elsewhere. "Suffra! Pay attention to me. Everything is fine."

Suffra's looked at Iva, snapping out of it. "I'm fine. Let's go." Iva looked incredibly concerned, but pulled her sister up and let her lead the way back out of their old house. She'd wanted to return, yet had managed to stay there for less than a minute. The lie made its way to her lips again. "I really am fine."

Secondary A/N: So, what do you think? Please tell me and leave a review. Don't forget to favourite and follow. :)